Prison administration and human insecurity in Nigeria

Abstract

The paper wants to investigate why prison which is supposed to rehabilitate prisoners has turned into training platforms that produce more hardened criminals as is the case in the Nigerian prisons. This culminates in prisons being the hive of criminals who in turn threatens the security of the country. In most cases, prison administration is blamed for lack of rehabilitation programmes thence the prisoners see this gap and uses it to perpetuate their criminal activities. In some cases, the same police who are supposed to implement the rehabilitation programmes participate in criminal activities. There appears to be a little appetite at investigating the discourses between prison administration for human insecurity and its efficacy in crime control. To obtain this information, the article relies on primary data sourced through mixed approach method of administering of the questionnaire on prisoners and key informant interview of ex-convicts, judges/magistrate, police, prison staff, members of civil society and non-governmental organisations. A total of 396 prisoners and 6 key informants were purposively administered with a questionnaire and interviewed in six prisons purposively selected from Nigeria’s six geopolitical regions. Data were analysed using chi-square and content analysis. Results showed that prison administration stimulates prisoners’ and ex-convicts’ involvement in crime (98%), and their criminal behaviour largely makes humans and the society insecure (93%). From the information, the paper concludes that the prison administration contributes enormously towards human insecurity in Nigeria.

Keywords: Administration, Human, Insecurity, Prison, Prisoners